ORCID

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

10-20-2008

Abstract

This Essay exposes and analyzes a hitherto overlooked cost of the current design of tort law: its adverse effect on innovation. Tort liability for negligence, defective products, and medical malpractice is determined by reference to custom. We demonstrate that courts’ reliance on custom and conventional technologies as the benchmark of liability chills innovation and distorts its path. Specifically, the recourse to custom taxes innovators and subsidizes replicators of conventional technologies. We explore the causes and consequences of this phenomenon and propose two possible ways to modify tort law in order to make it more welcoming to innovation.

Keywords

law & technology, science & technology, torts, evidence, innovation, negligence, products liability, medical malpractice, custom

Publication Title

Michigan Law Review

Publication Citation

107 Mich. L. Rev. 285 (2008)

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